


Shrapnel

by Batdad (MizGoat)



Series: The Quartermaster [4]
Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, original clone charcters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-03-08 20:54:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13466364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MizGoat/pseuds/Batdad
Summary: Some wounds don't quite heal, but maybe you can cover the scars with tattoos.





	Shrapnel

**Author's Note:**

> I've had the idea for this one for a while, but being stuck in an OSHA training class where I had to listen to list after list of gruesome ways people have died on the job kinda put me in the mood to write it.

Steady hissed as he tried to lift his left arm.

“Hey kid, can you give me a hand?” he called over his shoulder to where Tadhg was stripping out of his armor on the bench behind him.

“Getting arthritic, old man?” Default chimed in from across the small common room the squad shared.

“Why don’t by you come over here and find out you little nerf fart.” Steady’s retort was met with good natured laughter. Tadhg however had gotten up to sit next to Steady. There was a soft click as their armored knees bumped together.

“You hurt?” Tadhg asked in the quiet tone the vode used when they didn’t want to be overheard. There wasn’t much privacy in the GAR, but if anyone had overheard Tadhg with that low tone they would more than likely pretend they hadn’t as a matter of courtesy.

“Some lucky osik piece of shrapnel wedged itself under my shoulder plate. I just need help getting my chest armor off, so I can get to it.” Steady has already stacked his arm guards neatly in his foot locker.

“Sure thing,” Tadhg said, and let out a shaky breath.

It was a few moments work to remove the armor and sure enough there was a shard of durasteel sheet about half the length of Steady’s first finger and about as wide. His blacks around the wound were glossy and sodden with blood.

Steady deftly yanked the metal out of his shoulder and then with an involuntary yelp he yanked his shirt off as well. His cry of pain was echoed by a cry of shock from Tadhg. Steady quickly clamped his right hand over the cut.

“Pass me the tube of glue, would you?” Steady nodded in the direction of the drawer where he kept his personal belongings

“Shouldn’t you take that to medical?” Tadhg’s voice had taken that slight up-lilt that Steady has learned to recognize as he tone reserved for when he was hitting his mental limits.

“They have bigger fish to fry.” Like Haunt’s broken leg, he thought. Thank whatever looked after their forsaken souls that it was nothing worse for his squad this time.

“Anyway all they would be able to do is glue it shut and put a bacta patch on it. I can do that myself.” Steady made a little gimme motion with his left hand, the right one still clamped over the cut.

“Besides,” Anton said as he came up behind Tadhg and clamped his hands down on his shoulders causing him to flinch. “Sergeants have to set an example of stubborn stoicism. It’s in the regs. You can look it up.”

While Tadhg turned to give Anton a withering glare, Steady awkwardly opened the drawer with his left hand, pulled out the glue and a bacta patch and headed to the smallish communal fresher used by the soldiers bunked on this floor. Blissfully it was almost empty except for a few who had stripped quickly to race for the first showers after the battle.

By the time Tadhg joined him, he had filled one of the sinks with bloody water and had a layer of glue over the cut. He was still holding it closed to make sure the glue had set.

“Can I help?” Tadhg asked quietly.

“Get the bacta patch on for me?”

As Tadhg pressed the patch down to his shoulder Steady caught him staring at the tattoos that covered his upper back. Had Tadhg never seen him with his shirt off? Perhaps not. He didn’t care much for going bare chested. It was three neat rows of names written in block script that had caught Tadhg’s eye.

“Are they,” Tadhg trailed off.

“The ones I lost? Yeah.” Steady watched Tadhg’s face as he scanned over the lines of names. His lips moved slightly as he read each one to himself.

“And this?” Tadhg asked, pointing to the irregular red blotch that was tattooed over the left side of Steady’s ribs. Steady turned a little and Tadhg’s eyes lit up when he spotted the little heart shaped void in the red.

“Is it for Heart?” He asked, voice eager with realization. He had connected the shape to the name that was nestled at the nape of Steady’s neck. The first one recorded as more than just an ID number. Tadhg was good at connecting details.

“Yes.”

Tadhg seemed to be waiting for more, then his eyes widened.

“Oh, if it’s none of my business tell me to leave off. Sorry.” Steady’s stomach lurched.

“It’s not that. I just never know what to say about Heart.”

 

* * *

 

_It was still early days in the war. None of them quite knew what they were really in for yet. Not the way new shineys know now. It was still new enough to seem exciting some days. Names were new too, a rare treasure they weren’t quite sure they were allowed to keep yet. A few people had called him Steady as a joke, but it wasn’t a permanent fixture yet. CT-1857 had never called him that at all, so far as he could remember. It had always just been Sarge._

_He’d been in the batch of troopers sent to fill in the holes from the first battle of Geonosis._

_Steady had known when he first met him that CT-1857 was going to be trouble. That getting involved with a man on his squad was the worst possible idea. But CT-1857’s smile made him stupid._

_He’d tried to make it very clear just exactly how many regulations they would be violating when the man had showed up at the edge of his bunk that first night after lights out._

_“Care to give me a good dressing down for that then, Sarge?” he’d whispered and grinned. Steady forgot how to breathe._

_“Get in here,” he hissed._

_That night Steady had nearly bitten a hole through his pillow trying to muffle the sounds of his pleasure._

_And later he had held CT-1857 to his chest and listened as he told him about how scared he was of the battle they were being sent into. Steady had offered some meaningless advice about how he generally found he was too busy during the actual fighting to pay attention to fear._

 

* * *

 

He couldn’t tell Tadhg any of that. Even now, those parts of his memories seemed sacred. The rest however was largely a matter of public record, if you could find anyone else old enough to remember.

“Heart got hit with massive piece of shrapnel that ripped through his abdomen. He lived long enough for me to drag him down into a trench to die in my arms with half his guts spilled out over my lap. After the battle I realized some of his blood had seeped through the gaps of my armor and my blacks. I had a hard time convincing myself to wash it off. So before I did I outlined it with a permanent marker. A little latter I had a go at trying to tattoo the line in.” Steady gestured to the fuzzy fading black outline of the red splotch. “Not a skill I really possess. Had a tattoo artist on Coruscant to fill it in later. It was her idea to leave the blank spot. Never quite sure if I like it or not.” Steady shrugged.

Tadhg frowned, then grabbed Steady’s left hand.

“I’m sorry. I can’t even imagine.” Tadhg was good at connecting details. Steady squeezed Tadhg’s hand.

“Don’t worry yourself over it, Kid. I’ve learned to live with it.” Which was more or less the truth.

 

* * *

 

_Kneeling in the mud of the trench floor Steady ripped off his helmet knowing full well it was a stupid thing to do. Next came CT-1857’s. He needed to see his eyes, feel his skin. Be with him without the HUD in his bucket screaming at him about incoming artillery._

_He pressed a frantic kiss to CT-1857’s forehead, and began a littiny of absolute nonsense. Every term of endearment that came to mind spilled out in a desperate attempt to make sure there was nothing left unclear about how he felt. CT-1857 was silent with unfocused eyes until one phrase seemed to break through._

_“My beloved. My heart.”_

_“Heart? Is that my name, Sarge?” His strained voice was barely audible above the sounds of the battle._

_“Yes. Yes.” Steady became distantly aware that he was crying. As if someone else was using his face to do it._

_He held on a few moments more, though Heart never spoke anything else. It had barely been more than a week since Steady had first met him. And now there was nothing to do but leave his mangled corpse where it lay and hope that there was something he could do to keep the rest of his squad alive. Steady fastened his bucket back on, and opened the com channel to give orders._

 

**Author's Note:**

> I am aware that after going on my blog and talking about how Tadhg's the romantic one, it's kind of ridiculous that the story about the one (1) singular time Steady fell in love is the next thing I write, but muses thrive on being fickle. I swear there is a happier love story for Tadhg in the future.
> 
> I've also collected all the stories about them into a series to make them easier to find.


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